


To Lie In The Wreckage

by ktfics



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Nightmares, Post-New Dangan Ronpa V3, Virtual Reality, vr au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-03
Updated: 2019-04-03
Packaged: 2020-01-04 10:59:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,346
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18342296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ktfics/pseuds/ktfics
Summary: In his dreams, Iruma screams and Kokichi echoes those screams back in the real world.





	To Lie In The Wreckage

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this as a response to a prompt on my tumblr @dykeenvy! I'm still accepting prompts so feel free to message me one there!

In his dreams, it’s always the sounds that are the worst. Iruma’s avatar had been too cutesy for its appearance to phase him, but in its dying state her mind hadn’t differentiated between her real body and her virtual one; she was dying, and the choked-off screams and broken inhales that came out of her mouth were too real for Kokichi to distance himself from.

In his dreams, Iruma shouts and Gokuhara cries and Kokichi’s mind fills in all the other details. Her legs become elongated as they kick, her fingers stretch and crack at the joints as she tries to pry Gokuhara’s hands from her neck, her eyes bug out and her lips turn blue as the oxygen leaves her system. His brain takes the cutesy avatar that he had been able to dissociate from in the virtual world and distorts it, makes her rendered body bend and stretch without breaking, combines it with the reveal of her corpse after they awakened. The image of her twisted body and the sounds of her screams superimpose themselves over Iruma’s face as she laughs in the hospital cafeteria now that they have all risen from the dead. Kokichi finds himself looking away from a girl that he once shamelessly mocked on live television.

In his dreams, Iruma screams and Kokichi echoes those screams back in the real world.

He’s awake before he even remembers that he’s alive again as his door is assaulted with a series of knocks and then pushed open without waiting for a response.

He’s awake and there are hands tentatively cradling his own before he remembers that he’s lying on a mattress and not stainless steel.

In the dark of his room, Kaito’s eyes peer into his own, and the profile of the other boy clad in basic sweats and a T-shirt with his hair down is illuminated only by moonlight. For a second, the sight of him is both terrifyingly unfamiliar and too recognizable for comfort. He’s not as colorful as he was in game, and the look on his face is more unsure than Kokichi ever remembers seeing before, but his hands are the same as they were when they supported him in the hangar. Regardless, Kokichi still isn’t sure what he’s doing in his room.

“Hey- are you okay man?” Kokichi gulps in a breath of air and wills his own hands to stop shaking. He’s sweating all over, he realizes, and his bangs stick uncomfortably to the sides of his face. His hair is much longer than he remembers it being, and he would cut it himself but there are no scissors to be found anywhere in the hospital.

When he doesn’t reply, Kaito speaks again. “I heard you. From- from my room. Screaming.” The elaboration is unnecessary, Kokichi understands now; Kaito’s room shares a wall with his, and there was no way the other boy wouldn’t have heard him. Still, the thought makes Kokichi uncomfortable; the whole point of letting his mask down in front of Momota before he died was that he would be dead. There wasn’t supposed to be time to talk about it afterwards, and the other boy certainly wasn’t supposed to see him vulnerable ever again.

Kokichi gathers himself as best he can and hastily takes his hands back from Kaito’s grasp. He grabs onto the bed sheets beneath him in an effort to hide his shaking.

“Ha, silly Momota-chan!” His voice comes out as weaker than he’d like, so Kokichi swallows and tries again for a playful lilt. “I was just- I was just screaming so I could scare you! Did it work?” Momota still isn’t leaving, he just takes one of Kokichi’s hands back in his own. He’s gentle, like he’s afraid excessive pressure would scare the other boy away.

“Yeah, it fucking worked. You really got me.” He still isn’t leaving. Momota looks at him all soft, and strokes a thumb across the back of his hand. He’s shaky and sweating and more than that, he’s not even human anymore and Momota still won’t leave.

“Stop.” Kokichi feels tears prickle at the corner of his eyes and he squeezes them shut tight for a moment, both to get rid of the tears and to stop having to look at Momota’s misdirected kindness. “Go away.” Kaito shakes his head.

“No. You’re obviously hurting and I-”

“Nope! I’m not hurting, and I feel fine, and I don’t feel guilty, I just like seeing an idiot like Momota-chan waste his time on me!” Kaito’s grip tightens minutely on his hands, and the reaction is so unexpected that Kokichi’s half-baked mask drops entirely from his face. The boy still hasn’t left.

“I never said anything about you feeling guilty.” Kokichi shuts his eyes tight again but more tears get pushed out instead of dissipating entirely. He steals another breath of air and Iruma’s washed-out face attempts to mirror his actions behind his eyelids.

“Please. Go away.” Momota just moves in closer and grabs his other hand from where Kokichi had moved it away. “Why are you here?” He hopes to God that Kaito won’t be able to come up with an answer.

“You deserve help too, y’know. You’ve been waking up screaming for the past week and I don’t care if you hate me, I can’t ignore it anymore.” His words cut straight through the strings that had been holding him up, and Kokichi folds in on himself, cradling his hands that are still being cupped by Momota’s in his lap.

“You shouldn’t be touching me.” Kaito opens his mouth to reply but Kokichi cuts him off first. “I’m rotten all over. I ruined myself and everyone knows it and you’re stupider than you look if you still want to stay.”

“Yeah, well, you’re the idiot if you think I’m about to leave you now.” Kokichi gives a choked laugh at their half-hearted banter, and a sob escapes out alongside it.

He’s crying. For the first time since he was a child and someone put their hands on him just because they wanted to see him hurt, for the first time since he learned that there is nothing good in this world that you don’t have to work towards, he’s letting himself cry in front of another human being.

“Things are going to be better.” Kaito is crying too, he realizes. Not as much, but Kokichi can vaguely make out the shine in his eyes in the dim lighting.

“You’re an even worse liar than I am, Momota-chan.” He stutters the words out but they don’t stop Kaito from moving one of his hands to place it on his back and pull him in close.

“Yeah, I think you’ve already established that. But even if we don’t believe it, that doesn’t mean things aren’t going to get better anyways.” Kokichi reaches a hand up to grab a fistful of Momota’s shirt and buries his head just below the other boy’s shoulder.

He feels raw all over. He feels the dried blood caked on his skin and desperately wants to scratch all over just to get it off, but he keeps one hand in Momota’s and the other one close to the boy’s heart. Something cracks open in his chest and he lets it pour out of his mouth. He sobs and whimpers and gasps in air like he deserves to be alive and Momota just rubs a hand on his back and allows him to get tears all over his shirt.

“Things are going to get better.” Kaito whispers the words once again near his ear like he himself isn’t crying. They are now fully entwined in one another, one hand molding into the other, arms pulling in closer even as they are already chest-to-chest. Kaito tucks his head into Kokichi’s neck and they both shudder at all the contact.

For the moment, they hold onto each other and let themselves be human. For the moment, things aren’t good but they are warm and alive and really, that is all a corpse can ask for.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!


End file.
